21st Century Nightmare
by MelTheAngryVegan
Summary: Pitch Black visits the home of the Overland family in modern-day Burgess, only to find out that the oldest boy in the family, Jack, can see him. Pitch makes himself the uninvited guest more often than not and both Jack and Pitch will suffer the consequences.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: **Okay, I know I should be updating my other stories, but I threw up early Tuesday morning, so yeah. Didn't have much time to finish it. So instead, here's another story! It's based on the rotg modern au on tumblr, by thefrenchgal, aka Kemi. Credit for the au goes to her, I'm just writing some stuff for it! May continue this as an actual story, may not. Give me your opinion/feedback and tell me what you think~

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Jack's first encounter with the shadowy man was when he heard Emma crying in her sleep. It had woken it up immediately and he had quickly gotten out of bed, rushing to her room, trying not to awaken their mother if he didn't have to.

"Emma?" he called softly as he entered the room. The room was dark but Jack could see the faint outline of a man above his sister's bed. Anger flared through him but he told himself to calm down. He moved through the darkness of her room trying not to stumble.

His hand closed around the flashlight beside her night table. "Emma?" Jack gently shook his sister to wake her up. He didn't want to risk turning on the lights in case the person attacked, so the flashlight would have to do for now.

Emma turned over and let out a muffled whimper. "J-Jack?" she asked after a few minutes.

He nodded, smoothing her bangs with his hand. "Yeah, it's me. Everything okay?"

She shook her head and clung to his hand tightly. Jack moved so that he could properly hug her and she shifted into his lap, wiping her eyes. "B-bad dream…"

"How cute," the figure said, and Jack stiffened. "An older brother, eh? Of course, it's his duty to protect the child…"

Jack tightened his arms around Emma and snarled when he felt something brush against his shoulder, presumably fingers. "Jack?" Emma whispered uncertainly. The man on the other side of the bed looked just as shocked and withdrew his hand.

"It's fine, Emma." he said, putting on a smile. "Let me just check the room for any monsters, okay?"

She nodded and let Jack help her back into bed, curling up under the covers. He turned on the flashlight and let the fall directly on the man by Emma's bedside. He had ashen gray skin, with piercing gold eyes and black robes that matched his hair. He honestly looked baffled.

"No monsters, right Emma?" he said, keeping his voice cheerful despite the expression on his face.

Emma looked around the room and Jack realized that she did not see the man. "No monsters," she repeated softly, sounding relieved. Jack nodded and, keeping his eyes on the man, went over to his sister's bedside.

"Now, try to get some sleep. I'll stay here with you, if you want." Emma nodded wordlessly, and Jack chuckled, sitting on the floor next to her bed, elbows resting on the edge. He clicked off the flashlight and gently kissed her forehead, waiting for her to fall asleep.

When he was finally sure, he turned the flashlight back on and glowered at the man. "Who the hell are you," he hissed, "and what the hell are you doing here?"

The man tilted his head to the side, still adopting that puzzled expression. "You can see me," he said bluntly. "You can see me…"

"W-well, duh. Who else am I talking to?" Jack scoffed, taking a wary step back.

The man simply laughed, clasping his hands together. "Perfect! no one's been able to see me for quite a while…" he grinned, showing shark teeth. "This should be interesting. Your name's Jack, hm?" He leaned over the bed to get a better look. He didn't look the least bit scared and there was almost no fear — Pitch would have to change that.

Jack had no response, but continued to stare at the man. "Since you're so tongue tied at the moment, I suppose we'll have to converse another time." He smirked at Jack and crossed his arms. "My name is Pitch Black, and I'm the Boogeyman. I'm sure we'll be spending a lot more time together soon, Jack."

He snapped his fingers and in a flash of black sand, he was gone. Jack stood there still for the longest time before he turned off the flashlight and sank to the floor beside Emma's bed. It was the first of many coming nights that he would spend awake in the darkness.


	2. Chapter 2

**In case this wasn't clear enough, this story does take place in a modern setting. Anyway, I had this all typed up and forgot to post it. Enjoy!**

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Jack tried to forget about Pitch; he really did. A week passed since the incident. Emma wasn't having anymore bad dreams, and Jack checked his sister's room every night for the 'Boogeyman', but he was never present.

It was a huge relief off Jack's shoulders. He tried convincing himself that he had been so tired, tired from school and studying, that he had hallucinated. So Pitch was pushed out of his mind for now.

It was around seven thirty in the evening. Emma and his mother were out shopping and Jack was sitting at his computer, a mug of hot chocolate in his hand, a pencil tucked behind his ear. God, he hated math. The note son the computer screen did nothing to help clear the scribbles of numbers and equations on his notebook page.

After a few minutes, he gave up his useless struggle of trying to make sense of his homework. "I'll just do it later." he muttered to himself, standing up to take a well-deserved stretch break.

The early winter sun was already set, and darkness was descending. Jack thought it was kind of pretty. And that was when all of the lights flickered off.

He was startled, but quickly recovered. "Must've blown a fuse," he said to himself with a nod. He put his arms out in front of him, blindly stumbling his way to the kitchen.

He heard a thud and paused, frowning. Was someone else in the apartment? Robbers or burglars? He continued walking, feeling wary, unease creeping into his mind."Hello?" he called out. "Emma? Mom? Is tat you?"

Jack had the most terrible sense that someone was walking right behind him, breathing down his neck, sending shivers up and down his spine. He felt something brush against his leg and yelped, tripping over his own two feet in his haste to keep himself steady but run away from whatever had touched him.

His head hit the wall and he rubbed it with a groan, eyes shut tight in pain. When he finally opened them, he saw a pair of bright yellow eyes and a disembodied grin staring back at him.

A scream was caught in his throat and he just sat there staring in fear. Some sort of recognition finally clicked in his mind and he slapped a hand to his forehead. "Boogeyman," he finally managed to say, "what the hell are you dong here?"

Clearly disappointed at Jack's final reaction, Pitch snapped his fingers and stood up. The lights flickered back on, but they weren't at their full brightness. Light seemed to affect Pitch negatively. "Can't I just drop by to scare the living daylights out of a believer every now and then?"

Jack rubbed his sore head and stood up, glaring at Pitch. "Believer? What does that even mean?"

The Nightmare King sighed dramatically. "You wouldn't understand, you're still just a child." Jack opened his mouth to protest but Pitch cut him off, "Besides, your sister is due for a nightmare."

"Wh-what?" Jack's brow furrowed in confusion. "No, you can't give her any nightmares!"  
Pitch raised an eyebrow. "And why not, Jack? I don't think you're in any position to stop me," he leered over at him, grinning and flashing his sharp teeth. Jack backed up, uncomfortable."Fear is what keeps me alive, Jack. Like food or water."

Jack sunk to the floor, feeling the pain from his head intensify almost tenfold. He could barely process any of this. Pitch took notice and shrugged. "I've waited a while before returning, but I must say, it is pleasant to have another believer. It does wonders to strengthen me."

"You're really weird," Jack finally managed to say.

"I get that a lot."

Jack flipped on a light-switch and Pitch growled in annoyance, snapping his fingers to darken the room again. Suspicion confirmed: Pitch doesn't like light. If he could somehow use that against him…

"How long are you going to be staying here, anyway?"

Pitch shrugged, sitting on the couch. "As long as I please."

"Just go away, you home-wrecker," Jack groaned, trudging back over to the computer where his math homework still laid.

Pitch rolled his eyes and got off the couch, stalking over to Jack as he sat down. "What is that?" he asked pointing at the computer screen.

"Notes," Jack replied, picking up his pencil, a hint of irritation in his voice. "They're supposed to help me with understanding my homework."

"What exactly are you doing?" Pitch frowned down at the notebook page Jack was writing numbers on.

"Math."

"Hm. Looks more like failing, to me."

"Well, guess who asked you? No one."

"How rude, Jack."

Jack got back to tihnking of their earlier conversation. "Can you give someone else nightmares instead of Emma?"

"It depends. I could leave her alone entirely, but where's the fun in that?" He smirked and Jack turned around in his chair to glare at the man.

"What about me?"

The smirk fell off Pitch's face. "You?"

"Yeah," Jack nodded, an idea forming in his mind. "If I'm a believer or whatever… you draw strength from me… then you can give me nightmares, and leave Emma alone."

Pitch laughed slowly, confused at this turn of events. Jack was a foolish boy, really, trying to make a deal with the Boogeyman. "You're serious about this," Pitch said, trying to confirm that this was reality.

Jack nodded firmly. "If you leave Emma alone, then yes. You can hang around if you want, too. Just leave her alone."

Both of them knew that Pitch could easily break his word, and he could give both the siblings nightmares for as long as he wanted if he so wished it. But this deal… this deal was very intriguing. It would give him something to do, too.

And oh, the trouble and fear he could stir up.

Pitch grinned widely, displaying his sharp teeth again, and unnerving Jack. "Well then, Jack, you have yourself a deal."


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** _Yo, if bugs kinda creep you out, just warning that there a kinda creepy mention/use of them in this chapter. Just so y'all know! imsosorry thistooksupersupersuperlong ihaveliterally novalidexcuse_

_Thank you all for the feedback you gave me, I'm glad you're enjoying the story so far! The next chapter hopefully won't take as long as this one did xDx_

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Jack took a deep shudder of a breath, gripping the flashlight and shinging it through the dark room. "This isn't funny, Pitch," he called out quietly. "It's gonna look suspiscious if there's one apartment in the whole complex without power..."

It had been the Boogeyman's idea to play a game of 'hide-and-seek'. Or rather, a game of 'turn-off-all-the-lights-and-let-Jack-wander-aroun d-in-the-dark-and-get-terrified'. So far that prediction had come true.

Usually Pitch had left him alone other than visiting in the night to extract fear through the nightmares created. But sometimes he extracted fear in other ways than just nightmares. Such as these strange games. Jack didn't know which he thought was worse.

He felt a dark shadow brush up against his side as he crawled hands-and-knees on the ground. Two shadows ensnared him suddenly and he yelled in surprise, struggling to get away.

There was a cackle in his ear and he sighed heavily. "Okay, okay, you win. Now let me go."

"Now, that, that was fun!" Pitch crowed, snapping his fingers and letting the dim lamps flicker back on. The shadows slithered off of Jack and be brushed his arms, still feeling the gritty black sand against his skin. "We should do that again."

"Let's not," Jack said quickly, shaking his head. He clicked off the flaslight and sighed heavily and stood up. "Leave me alone... and leave the lights on! I still have homework to do, you know."

Pitch grimaced frmaaticaly. "Why do schoolwork when you can scare the living daylights out of someone?"

"Because I'm not creepy like you are," he replied flippintly, collapsing onto his bed and pulling his math book from his backpack. He started to concentrate on doing it while ignoring the dark presence skulking around his room and disrupting his work.

Pitch leered at him over his shoulder and Jack shuddered. "Too close," he growled, shoving a pillow at the other's face to get him to back off.

Pitch scoffed and tossed the pillow back on the bed. "Well, I'm off," he said, straightening up a bit and heading for the window. "I'll most likely be back some time tonight... expect it."

"I already have," Jack muttered with a bit of bitterness in his voice.

Pitch left, sinking into his shadow and slipping out the window. Only when Jack was sure he was gone did he put his homework away and start getting ready for bed. He quickly put everything away and grabbed an object he'd been using earlier today: his flashlight.

He turned off his room's lights and crawled under the covers of his bed, hiding the flashlight under the blankets with him. He pulled the covers over to the top of his head so that just his tightly shut eyes were peeking out. Jack used thicker blankets so that the light wouldn't shine through.

His mother and Emma would be home soon, and they would turn all the lights off before going to bed, so leaving on his lamp or the room light wouldn't work. Still, he had to try something...

His lack of sleep lately caught up with him and in a few minutes he was already sound asleep.

Late into the hours in the night, when the apartment was quiet and dark, a shadow slipped back into Jack's room via the window.

Pitch pulled himself up to his full height and loomed over the boy's bed, shaping dark sand in his hands. "What should I give you tonight...?" he muttered to himself, a thin smirk on his lips as the sand began to take its own form, its own idea. It was his art, really, and to him it was beautiful. Almost as beautiful as the fear he was going to extract.

As he began to pull back the covers to sprinkle the sand above the boy's head, he stopped cold when a flash of light hit his skin. Pitch recoiled, feeling it burn where it touched. Realizing what had happened, he let out a low chuckle.

"Very clever indeed," he conceded. "I'll admit you're quite a resourceful boy..." A shadow crawled up the bed and snatched up the flashlight and Pitch was caught between a sneer and a laugh. "A cute attempt."

Pitch let the flashlight dangle over Jack by the string, making sure to keep the beam of light away from himself. "But dear Jack... Did you really think you could fool the Boogeyman so easily?"

He tsked and send his dark sand to swirl around Jack's head, bringing him into a nightmare he knew would leave the boy shaking and scrubbing himsel for hours: being consumed alive by giant insects.

Jack whimpered in his sleep and his fists clenched, the rest of his body tensing as the nightmare took hold of him. "So naive..." Pitch sighed, smiling as a delicious wave of fear rolled off the boy and was absorbed as energy into him.

When the nightmare was finally almost over, Jack's eyes flew open and he sprang up out of bed with a barely suppressed scream. His chest was drenched in sweat and he felt the taste of bile rise up in his throat.

A hand gently touched his shoulder. He already knew who it was. "Nice try, Jack." Pitch chuckled softly, tilting the boy's chin so he could get a good look at his still fear-filled eyes. "Better luck next time."

Jack flung himself away from Pitch as quickly as he could and ran out of his room and into the bathroom, violently retching only minutes later. He breathed hard as tears ran down his cheeks and wiped the bits of drool hanging from his mouth.

His mother came by soon after and stayed awake with him the whole rest of the night. Even when he stayed home from school the next day, he didn't dare risk sleep. He still felt the bugs crawling all over his skin, playing in his mind over and over again.

Jack had to find some way to escape from all this before it killed him.


End file.
